Entertainment For Lively Minds
Bands with great singles but not so great albums
Posted by lit doof on 22 February 2009 - 7:33pm.
Just having a quick ponder about those bands who have really cut the mustard with their singles releases, but have rarely impressed over an album.
Let me start the ball rolling by submitting:
- Abba
- Muse
- Manic Street Preachers
- The Jacksons
- Kiss
- INXS
- The Police
Anyone care to add??
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I would suggest that INXS have never impressed full stop...
but that's just me... I thought Hutchence was a bit of a twat.
One suggestion from me... Queen. Most of their albums include 2 or 3 great singles and then lots of crap music hall numbers about going to the seaside.
New Order
New Order. Much as I love 'em, their singles were always much stronger than their albums. Especially early on.
Er, the Smiths
I love the Smiths, really love them, but they made short albums that all contained at least two fillers, usually more.
(And we're talking the four 'proper' albums here, not the compilations stuffed with brilliant singles and B-sides.)
Madness
None of their albums approach classic but they were one hell of a singles band.
Little known combo, the Beatles.
Yes, really.
Depends what you mean by “great”
If you did a random survey asking people to name ten Abba songs or ten Madness songs, they’d all be singles. If you asked for ten Beatles songs I reckon about half would be album tracks. Whether you think Beatles albums are any good or not, the fact of the matter is some of the most popular and well-known Beatles songs weren’t singles. Your average man or woman in the street knows Yesterday or Twist And Shout or When I’m 64. They may not be as familiar with The Ballad Of John & Yoko.
Can't agree on The Smiths,
but I've never quite got around to listening to an album buy The Jam but I love the Snap! compilation from the bottom of my heart.
Snap Volume 2
Jam albums are patchy, but they all have some great songs on them. You could easily compile a Snap! Volume 2 from album tracks and b-sides that I’m sure you’d love just as much as Snap! Worth doing a bit of i-tunes browsing or spotifying.
Elvis Costello
Great 1CD Best Of. Terrible albums.
Blur
I would never argue with the quality of Blur's singles but I have never been gripped by one of their albums.
I think this is as true of almost any similar UK guitar unit shifter of the last 15-20 years. Does anyone else feel that a towering single or two throws the rest of an album into dreadful relief? The entire Britpop era was characterised by acts with a blazing radio hit and an album of utter mediocrity (with a 4-star Q magazine review).
On the other hand, an unassuming 35-minute disc by an obtuse US act on, say, Drag City Records will tend to maintain its obliquely-set standard from soup to nuts. Perhaps the vacuum of ideas on the average platinum-selling release represents the airless gulf between art and commerce!
I still have a soft spot for Parklife
When it came out I remember me and my mates being amazed that there was not a single duff track on it - everyone is a winner.
Definitely Maybe too
Parklife!
Yes now I think about it, Parklife was very good.
Definitely Maybe was almost all big singles, wasn't it? Except Digsy's Dinner. And even Digsy's Dinner was no Bonehead's Bank Holiday.
Pulp's "Different Class" was the other exception to the rule. And Supergrass were decent! But I can think of five Britpop albums that, even coloured with teenage enthusiasm, were straight back to Our Price:
Echobelly's "On"
Menswear's "Nuisance"
The Bluetones' "Expecting To Fly"
Sleeper's "Smart"
and Cast's "All Change", whose debut so infuriated me so that I threw it over a wall in a rage. By that point I was persona non grata at the returns counter.
Oh God yeah
Funnily enough I was listening to Gene this morning - again a patchy album and nowehre near as good as I remembered.
Good call on the first Supergrass album - that really was the soundtrack to a fantastic summer
Another good one from the era that - 'It's Great When You're Straight'
Mind you, I'd argue that Menswear only produced one decent song - 'I'll Manage Somehow'. I have a signed copy. I've never actually admitted that since I was 17.
The Manics?????
Good grief man....they've made some superb albums...The Holy Bible only works as a complete record. Playing Yes or The Intense Humming of Evil doesn't work in isolation.
Paul Weller's entire canon revolves around excellent singles. The Jam, The Style Council and his solo stuff have some of the best singles known to man and not one decent full blown album.
Hit Parade, Modern Classics
20th Century Masters - The Millennium Collection: The Best of Style Council (also one available for the Jam), Style Council: Greatest Hits, Sweet Loving Ways: The Collection, Gold, *breathes* Compact Snap!, The Sound of the Jam, Jam collection, The Jam singles box set...
Paul Weller, a well collected man.
Weller - a well-collected man?
That's probably because he's one of the few* who've had significant success under three different guises - hence the many compilations.
* The rest? Well, I can think of: -
Roy Wood (The Move, Electric Light Orchestra, Wizzard)
Paul McCartney (Der Fabs, Wings, solo)
err... any more?
Neil Young
Buffalo Springfield, Solo and C,S,N&Y.All have had "Best ofs"
Umm, Ashley Hutchings: Fairport, Steeleye, Albions and general compendium, including other projects.
Wild Wood
Is a great album from start to finish. Apart from that - bang on